Bob Doman Is the Director and President of the National Association for Child Development

Kristin (Host): Bob Doman is the Director and President of the National Association for Child Development. You're going to be hearing us talk about something called NACD. That's what that stands for. It was founded in 1979 he's also been a leader in the treatment of autism since the early seventies working with the team that first understood autism as a neuro-developmental problem and identified, understood and treated sensory dysfunction. Bob and NACD help bring sound therapy to the country and later developed the listening program with his son, Alex Doman, followed by the targeted sound intervention programs with his NACD team. The list goes on and on of everything that Bob has accomplished and done for our community. I just think the world of this man. I think you are in, like I said, for a real, real treat. So thank you so much, Bob for being here today.

Bob Doman (Speaker): Thank you, Kristin.

Kristin (Host): So, we're going to be talking about the neuro-plasticity and what that means is hope and change for autism. And I know when you first talked to me about it, when you think about the brain being able to be plastic and change, I think so many people out there watching today still believe that you become concreted or at a certain age, it just stops. I know today we're going to be talking a lot about that and how our kids at any age can really thrive and continue to do better and better. Before we get started with that, we talked about--you've been doing this since the 70s. My goodness! You've been around before autism was even a popular name with one in 59, I'm sure that you've seen it really transform from one in, I guess it would probably be 5,000 or 2,500 back then?

Bob Doman (Speaker): I have. It's from childhood schizophrenia to autism to autism spectrum. I really wish I can say I've seen as much change as I would've hoped I had seen in 50 years. Things are not progressing at the rate I would like to see them progress. And it's actually sad that it's so difficult to get people to look at the big picture and to perceive autism as not a disease that is interest stuck, but that it is a developmental issue, a neuro-developmental issue, that you can address and produce significant change. I need people to aim higher and perceive it differently and understand that we don't have to settle for a little when it's possible to eat a lot.

Kristin (Host): Absolutely. I know you, like you said, you've been working with autism for quite some time. Do you have it all figured out?

Bob Doman (Speaker): I wish I could say I had it all figured out. I'm happy to say that we keep getting a better and better and better understanding. The reality is it's terribly complex and I can deal with a hundred different children on the spectrum. We have 100 different combinations of problems and issues and need their own unique solutions. So, it's never going to be something that we have figured out, but I'm happy to say we keep understanding more and more and more and getting better and better at taking care of it.

Kristin (Host): Now, we talked about this word neuro-plasticity. Before I ask you all the different amazing techniques that you have with that, let's talk about something that most people might not understand. I know that when I first heard the word neuro-plasticity, it kind of makes sense. Like you think your brain plastic growing and all that, but a lot of people may be watching for the first time, may be completely unaware of what even the word means. So, before we start diving into neuro-plasticity, let's talk about what that definition actually means.

Bob Doman (Speaker): Essentially, all human development is a reflection of neuroplasticity and essentially neuroplasticity means that as we stimulate the brain, as we use the brain, you're growing connections between the neurons, equating networks within the brain. And that is what actually changes our function. The change from a newborn infant to an adult, every aspect of that is a reflection of neuroplasticity. A big part of what people need to understand is the fundamentals of it are the brain needs specific input, delivered with sufficient frequency, intensity and duration to actually trigger the change. So many of the things that are being done with our kids really ignore those basic tenets of what neuroplasticity is. Instead of having input received many times a day, it's once or twice a week. And if you will, the very nature of the brain is when we appropriately stimulate it, we excite a bunch of neurons and as soon as we stopped the input, it begins to fade away.

So, if we come in on Monday and even if we're doing the right thing, we get some excitement going in the brain and we don't come back until Wednesday or Thursday, we keep covering the same ground again, if you will. One of the reasons that we worked directly with parents and training parents so parents can work with their kids daily, is so we can come in on Monday morning, Monday afternoon, Monday evening, and keep pushing it forward. And also doing it with the necessary specificity, meaning the more targeted we are, the greater effect we have, the greater the change we'd produce.

Kristin (Host): How long have you been using neuro-plasticity?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Since 1969.

Kristin (Host): Wow!

Bob Doman (Speaker): Which is very interesting. I'm second generation to work. My father was a physiatrist and then he specialized in rehabilitation and I kind of grew up knowing, understanding neuroplasticity and you can change the brain. And initially, that work was done with brain injured kids or we're taking kids who people said, you can't change anything. This child is cortically blind, they have these physiological issues, they have these structural issues, you're not going to change it and changing it through specific input. I've spent my entire career understanding and using neuroplasticity and sadly, the world is just beginning to understand that it even exists, let alone how to utilize it.

Kristin (Host): How can our children take advantage of neuroplasticity?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Kids on the spectrum, we actually have an interesting situation because we need to determine what pieces need to be addressed, which are again, very unique to each individual child. We have to determine what specific input is going to help produce those changes, supply that input in a targeted way with frequency, intensity and duration. At the same time with the spectrum, we've got almost a unique issue that we have all these sensory issues; sensory-isms stems, what I call debilitating century addictive behaviors that actually trigger negative neuroplasticity. If you look at a lot of our kids and say, "What is their brain doing more than anything else?" Well, if it's this, guess why it gets better, would get stronger, not better, get stronger? Actually, what they're doing is actually making the situation worse through a good part of their day. We unfortunately have kids on the spectrum who received, if you will, minutes or a couple hours of therapy a day, and spend hours and hours and hours stimming and making their brain worse. It's a particularly tough problem. There's a lot of things we need specifically to do and a lot of things we need specifically to stop.

Kristin (Host): Now, I'm thinking about, when our children are on the spectrum, what interferes with their typical neuro development. Like what, what's happening, what's the cause of their brain even starting to do this?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Well, cause is one of those big question marks and there's talk that there's genetic predisposition to it. There's talk that the toxins are contributing factors. I don't know what causes it and people are working specifically on that end. My work has been on how do we fix it, if you will. How do we change it? And I think it's going to be a long time before we really know the cause. But essentially what happens if you start off with a child, be it a child on the spectrum or a brain injured child or a child with Down Syndrome, child with any kind of developmental issue and you start off with some sensory dysfunction, and it could be in a visual, tactile, it could involve all the senses. You learn through your senses. We stimulate the brain, we trigger neuroplasticity through our senses.

So, to whatever degree the senses aren't working, we lack development. For example, if I have a severely brain injured child, who is essentially deaf and blind, the tactile, they can't feel their body, that child without a lot of specific input, just does not develop, at all. We see these kids who are 10 years old functioning almost like newborns because the brain isn't receiving input stimulation. With the kids on the spectrum, we've got these sensory issues that are negatively impacting the input to the brain. And to make it even worse, often it's providing the brain with bad input because of the sensory issues involved. We have that.

Then we have the issue that normal development is rapid. Change is rapid. Change is the norm. You slow down development, change no longer is the norm, staying the same becomes the norm. So, if you will, rather than brain seeking change, the brain works to keep things right where they are. The longer it takes to get the kids started and moving, the more the brain is

trying to maintain homeostasis and stay right where it is. That's a big issue. Then there's all kinds of issues relative to children about learning. You present, involved in life, so it's-- There are a lot of very significant pieces that slow down that development, potentially start that development, that we have to address individually and specifically to change.

Kristin (Host): Well, I know that you've coined the term debilitating sensory addiction or otherwise known as DSA's, right? What's the difference between sensory need and sensory stimulation and development?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Okay, good question. When we first started in the back in the early seventies, and had what we called the dark kind of doing autistic unit was the first organization to work specifically with autism on the planet. Our foundation of our understanding was that there was a huge sensory component, that it wasn't a psychiatric problem, that it was a developmental sensory problem. And one of our initial perceptions was that we can look at what the children were doing in terms of stimming okay. And from that gain information in terms of what sensory channels are not working properly. So, if I've got a child who's flapping their hands out here, I've got a child who stimulating their peripheral vision, which essentially tells us that the symptoms are just not working properly. But part of what we thought way back at the beginning was that the kids doing that was an effort for them to treat themselves.

Unfortunately, 50 years later, a lot of people still think that the kids stimming is an attempt for them to treat themselves, which it absolutely is not. They are playing with what's broken, they're reinforcing that negative neuroplasticity and if you will, them doing that is debilitating because it stopping neuro-development. It's sensory and by definition it's something they can't do without. It's an addiction and the addiction just tend to grow and grow and generalized to more and more different kinds of stims. Understanding that all the sensory play, the stimming the kids do is really incredibly harmful for the brain and their development.

Kristin (Host): Now, for some parents out there though, if you try to break quote unquote the stim, the child can become aggressive or self-injurious. What do you do for that?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Okay. Generally, it's really not an issue to find other ways to engage the kids. You don't treat him like he's- the child's being bad. "Johnny don't- stop that or I'm going to put you in timeout or something." No, you perceive it. Johnny's brain is doing something we don't want it to do and we need to redirect it and distract them and engage him with something else. The truth is one of the most difficult aspects of working with these kids is we virtually have to try to keep them engaged every waking moment of their day.

Kristin (Host): I always think-- Do you remember a movie? Gosh I think it was- it had to be in the 80's at some point. It was called The Toy. I think it was called The Toy with Richard Pryor. Do you remember that movie? So, he basically-- This really, really rich family, this kid had every toy imaginable, but he needed a human being to just be with them whenever he wanted them to

be with him. Richard Pryor was quote, unquote the toy. This rich kid who had like everything, every toy imaginable, he didn't have human interaction. Richard Pryor, like whenever the child was awake, whatever this kid wanted to play, he had to be on and do it. That's kind of what it always reminds me of with my son is, I'm the toy.

Bob Doman (Speaker): And if you will, if you, if you look at these stims as addictions, think, if you want to stop smoking, it's hard to do that if you smoke a bit. It's really hard to do it if you smoke a lot. We've got to stop smoking to end that addiction. And with our kids, we've got to engage them as much as we possibly can to stop the addictions. And that affords us the opportunity to normalize the sensory formats, which the kids keep breaking, and also build the, what we call sequential processing and cognition, which permits them to do more and more and more normal appropriate things. In doing that, it breaks us out of the negative pattern.

Kristin (Host): Or the addictive pattern that you're basically talking about. If we learned through our senses, anything that impacts the senses, like all development. So, everything is impacting our senses. Is that correct?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Correct, correct.

Kristin (Host): Beyond the sensory issues, what else is impacting the development of our children?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Cognition. I've spent a lot of time understanding and building methodologies to build cognition. We could try to address sensory issues, and if we're not building cognitive function, the child's global development really isn't going to change. The difference between a one year old, a two-year old, a three and a four to five or 10 is improvement in cognition. And essentially when we talk cognition, we're talking about short term memory, how much you take in visually and auditorily and working memory, how many pieces of information you can manipulate. For example, generally we look at short term memory, working memory as sequential pieces. So, for example, you measure short term memory as a digit span. How many numbers can you listen to in sequence and remember. That develops at about three quarters to one digit per year for the first years.

So, for example, a two-year old will follow a two-step direction, a three-year old, can work and follow a three-step direction and each sequential increase, increases the complexity of thought, which is reflected in the behavior and function of the child. For example, a terrible two, is a childhood processes too, be that child, be two years old or 20 years old because complexity of thought is I want/don't want, end of discussion, which is why you get all the tantrums. And when they sequence of three, we get what I term lock and block behavior, which essentially is if the child perceives something is fun and nonthreatening, they tend to be compliant. If they perceive it as threatening in any way or important than they just lock up on. As we build that sequential processing, build complexity of thought, we change entire behavior patterns and

rotated the kids in the spectrum, a biggie for them. Kids don't generally play really well independently until they can sequence of three. We have these kids who process one or process two, you wish they could play by themselves and appropriately entertain themselves. It's not going to be, not until we get that cognition up, a step or two higher.

Kristin (Host): And what's the highest level? Is it seven?

Bob Doman (Speaker): No, it's not. Generally, you say typical adult, which if you will, has the processing skills generally of a seven-year old. He's about a six or seven. I just received a video from one of my families, a Romanian family, brain injury and cerebral palsy child, a child who has all kinds of physical issues, structural issues. The family, just three months ago, moved from Romania to Ireland. So, this little brain injured four-year old child, learning a new language was doing sequential processing and had a forward auditory digit span of 12 and could do 11 in rehearse.

Kristin (Host): Oh my gosh!

Bob Doman (Speaker): With a foreign language,

Kristin (Host): I can barely do seven! I am thinking like when you memorize a phone number, like seven?

Bob Doman (Speaker): No, a phone number is really a two So, sorry, your phone number is a two and not a seven.

Kristin (Host): Oh, okay. I hope I'm at least a seven.

Bob Doman (Speaker): No, there's no limit and what's really important for our kids on the spectrum is to understand that the brain has the neuroplasticity virtually through our lives. And whether your kids two or 22, the potential is still there, given the right specific input to produce the change. Certainly, the younger, the better, the easier, but it's always possible to produce change if we're doing the right stop, and if we're stopping the things they should not be doing

Kristin (Host): And at any age, because I know we've talked about this before, but clearly I have a 17 year old, he turned 17 in April and I love hearing this answer, so I always ask it because I already know the answer from you, but those that are watching might not know this answer. Can a child's brain, even at 17 or 22, let's say they're at a three right now in digit spans, can they continue to improve?

Bob Doman (Speaker): The simple answer is absolutely. It's important to understand that the change is incremental. You say he's three. If you look at a typical three-year old and look at a typical four-year old, the difference between those two kids is really dramatic. The three-year

old is struggling to put three, four words together in a phrase and the four-year old is talking in paragraphs. So huge difference, just that one incremental change. We keep producing these incremental changes. We're dramatically increasing and improving the quality of life.

Kristin (Host): And that's really what it's about, is the quality of life.

Bob Doman (Speaker): It is. Quick story. I'm sitting here in my office looking out at the mountains here in Utah and we still have snow here, by the way. And one of the experiences that I remember vividly, I lived in the valley up in the mountains and when my youngest son-- We always had to go over the mountains to get anywhere. From the time he was five, a little tiny, I'd say, "Man, look at the mountains, wow! They're beautiful today. Look at the sun and the mountains and blah." And I remember the day that he looked at-- We were driving over the mountains, he said, "Wow, dad, look at the mountains!" And it was his processing had reached a point, where a mountain wasn't just this bump in the ground. That he could see all the dynamics and the wonder of it. That's quality of life.

Kristin (Host): Absolutely. And I know one of the things that you talk about, it's really important when a child asks, "What's that?" Can you explain why that question is so important?

Bob Doman (Speaker): If you look at a typical child's development, they start off when they're a little tiny and we're showing them things and naming them. We've got picture books and we're showing them things and naming them, and their brain starts learning things have names, and if they have a name, it becomes more relevant. And with that normal, rapid development, all those typical kids reach a point where they're saying, "What's that? What's that? What's that?" Because they don't know the name of it. And the brain is saying it's not significant to me until I can name it. What happens is as they're processing develops, the "What's that" keeps being- they keep looking for greater detail and depth in the information. So, it's no longer, "What's that?" "It's a chair." It's "What's that?" "It's a living room chair" to "what's that?" "It's a leather living room chair" and the brain keeps looking for complexity.

Because of that, in that typical developing child, the brain is constantly tuned in and present to the world, identifying all those things they can name and wondering "What's that" with everything it can't. Unfortunately, almost all kids who have a developmental issue, miss that "what's that" stage. And because they missed that stage, their brain, rather than wanting to know what everything is, learns to virtually newer, most everything. You could walk through the living room of your house, and your brain's going to name everything you walk past with the complexity it can name them. You walk past that living room chair in your house, it's not just a leather chair, it's a brown leather chair. It's your favorite chair. You bought it at such and such. You paid this much for it, it's got a ring from a glass on the right arm of it. Every time you walk past that chair, your brain goes through all that and that keep your brain very present and aware and active. You can take a child on the spectrum who processes at two, walk through a room and essentially his brain didn't see anything.

Kristin (Host): Because when you get input back in-- Almost like the way I think of it is, it's like when you're putting in files in a computer, you might have a computer and it just might be nothing until you start putting in and saving files, saving files, categorizing them, and then when you go to search for it, it's there. The way you speak about it reminds me of that, for our children is that we need to start categorizing things, helping them with that input, so then they have those filing cabinets where they can find the different categories. Is that kind of what you're trying to say?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Yes, that certainly is a big chunk of it, and think in terms of-- Often what happens with the kids on the spectrum is they're not present, people don't work on their cognition, people don't work on the things to make them more present, to stop the DSAs that stopped them from being more present and they try to teach them some specific things. The reality is the vast majority of what you know, no one taught you. Okay. You learned it by being present. Trying to realistically educate anyone and bring them into the world, without them being present is really a losing battle.

Kristin (Host): When you're talking about being present, let's elaborate on that, just for those that are watching. You're not meaning that you're just showing up to the room and you're sitting there. There's definitely more to it.

Bob Doman (Speaker): I find it interesting, every few months they talk about, "Oh, we've got this new tests to determine if a child's on the spectrum." You know what, if you work with kids on the spectrum and if you can't identify a kid on the spectrum, within about five seconds, you're doing something wrong. And the primary thing you see isn't necessarily the stimming, it's how present they are. You walk into a room using your central vision being present, and you specifically look at things. You look at somebody's face, you look at specific objects and depending on the degree of involvement of the child on the spectrum, they generally are not looking at specific things. They're not looking from face to face, to object to object. They're kind of shut off their central vision and stimming on the peripheral, be it the edges of, on the ceiling or window edge or something. So, a huge part of this is how present are you? How much are you just learning from walking into a room? And more specifically, how much are you learning from looking at that face and listening to the words coming out and reading that face and understanding the communication.

Kristin (Host): Come to think a lot of times people least find the families that I've dealt with, especially I would say, new families getting the diagnosis or maybe not having a diagnosis yet or in denial, and I hate to say that word, but there are a lot of families, they just don't want to hear that word. You hear them talk about their children and the child's sometimes standing right in front of you and they'll be like, "Oh, no, Bobby does this. And oh no, he did that. He's shy right now. Or you he's not always like this." And I always try to explain to families, especially if you're trying to get evaluated, always talk about the worst day. Never talk about the best day

because there's probably, if you're there, there's probably a lot more better days than there are good days.

Bob Doman (Speaker): One of the big things I've talked about and lectured a lot is that you have to work with a whole child. Unfortunately, the road has broken our kids down into pieces. You've got the OT that works on some pieces and the speech therapists that works on pieces and the PTO works on some pieces and these different educators that work on some pieces and a handful of doctors that work on different pieces and that doesn't work. You've got to look at every one of these kids as a whole individual. I want to know what the kid eats. I want to know how he sleeps. I want to know who he interacts with. I want to know what he'll play with if he'll play. I want to know everything about that child to understand that child to then determine what specific things we need to work on to help that child.

We typically work with about 350 kids on the spectrum and have since '79. It's a lot of kids, a lot of whole kids and it's really only through working with whole kids, you really understand the big picture of the spectrum and of the individual.

Kristin (Host): Absolutely.

Bob Doman (Speaker): If you've got a team, you know it's interesting that they tend to call it a team. I rarely ever find a team that ever speaks to each other. Everyone does their thing. Everyone has their own priority, as opposed to looking at the whole child and saying, "This is the continuum of things we need to work on. This is what we are to prioritize." These are primary and move and develop the entire thing. But unfortunately, rather than the world getting closer to working with whole children, it's tending to break the kids down into more and more little pieces. So, no one ever sees the child.

Kristin (Host): A great example of that, I think is, I remember when I was pregnant with my son, and we had lost a few before him, and so they send you to quote on quote the specialist team. And there's five doctors and at first you think, "Oh, this is great. There's five doctors looking at our case." And then you realize that some of these doctors, you might only see once ever in the whole time of your pregnancy. What we noticed was that they missed stuff because they weren't talking to each other. We were just a chart and whatever notes they decided to write down, those would be what they might have learned about me. So, when you're saying that, it totally- that's what it reminded me of was that, these teams are great in the way it sounds. However, unless you have a true team that all talk to each other and learn about that child needs, and I'm not talking on a quarterly basis. It needs to be at the very least a weekly basis in my opinion, because I know with my own son, they change all the time.

Bob Doman (Speaker): They do, they do and unless you're looking at the whole child, you don't know why.

Kristin (Host): Yes, you don't know if they didn't sleep well that night.

Bob Doman (Speaker): Oh, Johnny's having a terrible week and Johnny's having a terrible two weeks. He just has had a neurological episode. No, Johnny's got a cavity and it hurts. And the physiology affects the neurology. That's why it's so important you got to look at the whole case and understand what's going on or you're lost or fumbling in the dark.

Kristin (Host): Are there limits on how far we can develop processing abilities or how far we can take our children? I know you answered that a little bit when you were talking about the gentleman as at a 12 or 13, which I don't think I'll ever be at, but when it comes to numbers--

Bob Doman (Speaker): No, there are not limits and I think it's important to understand the kids on the spectrum do not necessarily need to live their lives on this spectrum. We have lots-- We've been doing this lots of years and we've got a lot of kids who today are functioning adults who have no clue they were ever on this spectrum. They function normally, not with little quirks. They function normally; they function well. And I think that potential was there. It's depending on the degree of involvement of the child. By the way, the degree of involvement is degree of sensory dysfunction, degree of DSAs and their level of cognition. Those are kind of the biggies.

Depending on how much work there is, how many things, essentially determines how much we really have to get it dedicate to addressing it. Putting a child in a classroom where he sits there and stims three quarters of the day isn't going to do it. Going to therapy once or twice a week isn't going to do it. Taking a vitamin isn't going to do it. You've got to work with that whole child, address all those pieces. Part of why it's on parents as if we can hit this really hard, particularly when the kids are younger, it gets a lot easier. It's hard- it's hard for a parent of a two-year old to understand that unless we develop that child, you're going to have a 20-year old acting like a two-year old and that really is not a pretty picture.

Kristin (Host): But yet when they're 20 and let's say a family is watching right now, and let's say they are at a two-year old level, that does not mean that they can't start now and try to help with that brain activity doing the right things. Correct?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Correct. Neuroplasticity is there. The longer addictions exist, the more difficult they are to break and truth is, the longer they exist, the more difficult that often becomes for the family to have the nerve to try to break them. You've got that kid walking around flinging his hat- his hangar all day long, and they tried to take it away from him and he freaks out. That's a tough deal for them, and it takes a lot to teach them how you do that without confronting it and that it's not a no, it's engaging--

Kristin (Host): The re-direction that you talked about though, and so I want to talk a little bit about NACD and the program itself, because I love talking about neuroplasticity, but I love your

program and there might be people watching going, ". I really- I don't know what the- I know he sounded like there's some home program, but I don't really know what the heck he's talking about.",

Bob Doman (Speaker): Well, let me explain it. First of all, we're international. For example, I'm going next week to Romania for 12 days seeking kids. Because of the nature of our program, we assess the kids, design individual programs, train the parents in the implementation of the programs, coach the parents in the implementation of the programs and then every four months reassess and do a complete makeover. So, it's possible for parents anywhere on the globe, with kids on the spectrum to provide their kids with really targeted specific input and make a dramatic change. We don't have a facility that you come to and we do the work. We have 15 chapters around the United States, international chapters, and we work just with Skype. Some families we actually physically see.

We see the kids every four months, design a comprehensive program, train the parents, provide ongoing coaching. Our families have access to us every day, and we constantly tweak and modify what we're doing based on what we see. One of the things we encourage families to do is post videos to our portal constantly. So, we're physically-, we're actually eyes on seeing how they're implementing something, seeing when the child has a problem, seeing where we have to adjust and modify and constantly tweak what we do, which is a nice word for being as specific as we can. Once again, going back to the neuro plasticity, specific input in sufficient frequency, intensity and duration. We have over 3000 different methodologies we use and we add them weekly, because we have to be specific. It drives me nuts when I see these programs where they have a handful of things they do to everybody. That's a joke.

Kristin (Host): Well, we say this and I say this in many of the interviews, so if you guys are watching, you probably heard me saying it in another interview as well, but if you've seen one child with autism, you've seen one child. Everybody is unique. Everybody is different. It's just like our fingerprints. Nobody has the same fingerprints that we have. And that's what I love about your program is that you really look at the child as an individual. You look to see, "Okay, this is working, that's not working."

Now one question I have for you, because I'm thinking of parents, if they said, "Oh gosh, you have to be on the child 24 hours a day." Well not all of us are the toy or there's no batteries in us, even though we like to believe we're the energizer bunny. So, what happens for that guilt? I know for me, I can speak from my own experience. I always feel guilty. I always feel like there's moments where I just- I have to sit down. There's no more left in me. I need a break for an hour. I feel guilty if somebody is not always on with my child, like at any moment. I've really- I'm trying to come to terms with that to be like, "Okay, he's going to bounce his ball. My son's stim is bouncing. I used to joke he was going to be a Harlem Globe Trotter one day, because this kid can bounce like nobody's business, but you know, that's his stim, mind you. I'll hear him bouncing and in my head I'm like, "Oh, I need not to be tired. I need to like go do this." How,

one, do we relieve that guilt from parents and two, how do we know that there's going to be moments where our kids are going to stim and all we can do as our best, I guess?

Bob Doman (Speaker): To answer the first question, the truth is, the curse of every good parent is we feel guilty.

Kristin (Host): Then I'm a great parent.

Bob Doman (Speaker): You never feel you're doing enough. Good luck with that one. But what we need to do, again, if we understand the child, we've worked to develop things they can do that are okay, and like good, independently. That can be tough because often the things that they will do independently aren't necessarily a stim, but there's something equally bad, which is a perseveration. A child watching the same video on YouTube over and over again, listening to the same music over and over again, wanting you to read the same book to them over and over again. That's perseveration and that is equally as destructive to the brain. We have to find things that we can keep changing that will engage them, if you will.

Most kids on the spectrum, even though they had the visual issues, they tend to be a little stronger visual learners than auditory learners and often we can- if we can get the central vision up to where they'll actually attend to a screen, we can create a lot of therapeutic videos for them and do a lot educationally just through videos, which is something they often can do by themselves without direct supervision. But again, every challenge is unique and we need to find, based on where their cognition is, the processing is, the sensory function is, how can we create things they can do independently for those periods where you just can't be there.

Kristin (Host): And there's days where you can't be there and for people watching, I've been on this journey for, I think, almost, yes, going on 15 years now and you constantly are learning and you will feel guilty. So, yay, I'm a great parent, yay! But there's moments where you say, "Okay, I did my best," and maybe you are trying to redirect them and then they're not doing it. What I've learned is that, okay, that moment, that that doesn't have to define your whole-- Kind of like a diet. Sometimes people will be on a diet and they go, "Oh, I totally messed it up, so now I'm going to do nothing because I've already screwed it up. I eat that cheeseburger. Now, gosh, what am I going to do?" And I think with our kids, there's moments where sometimes that's all we have to give and if they're going to say no, then if that's just an hour, then that's that hour and you just move on from there. That's something that Bob, I know we've talked about, you're like, "Okay, well that happened there and now you've got to move on." We're not perfect--

Bob Doman (Speaker): Tomorrow is always a new day.

Kristin (Host): Exactly. So, I love that. Now, how do people find you, Bob? I know they can go to your website, right?

Bob Doman (Speaker): They go to the website nacd.org. We've got about 900 pages of information there. I think we have a few hundred videos. So, there's a lot of information there. There's a mountain of stuff parents can learn just from our cycle about NACD.

Kristin (Host): I know that they can call for more information on if they want to sign up for Nacd, the actual program.

Bob Doman (Speaker): Yes. We encourage people to really look at what we do. If they go to the site, they go to what's called Get started, there's a specific section for parents with kids on the spectrum to get started. It gives them some general information about our approach, gives them specific articles to read. And if they do that and they understand it and see us as a fix for him, terrific, we're happy to help.

Kristin (Host): Well, I know you have some great YouTube channels too. I've watched all of them and they're very, very helpful guys. It doesn't cost anything. You can just go to YouTube, Google his name and then all of these things will pop up. For me, I no longer buy the magazines, for the most part, in the grocery store. I'm mostly like looking at YouTube when I'm in line or trying to look for something. So, I think that's a great way to do that. I know you guys are giving a free gift, which is really exciting. Guys, this gift that they're giving is so generous. It's typically a retail value of $75. All you have to do is email info, which is [email protected] to claim your free download, really simple. The download is Guide to Child Development and Education: Miracles of Child Development. Bob, can you talk a little bit about what this is, what they're going to be getting from you guys?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Essentially, it's a primmer for parents. It's helping you to understand neuroplasticity, what we're talking about, helps you to understand the sequence of processing devolvement of cognition, understand how to look at education differently, more targeted, more specific, more intense, basic child management techniques and understanding. Most of what we do to, in truth to- just to manage our kids is not done properly. And we're often poking the bear, if you will, rather than helping the situation.

Kristin (Host): It's kind of like the cliff note version is how to help your kid.

Bob Doman (Speaker): Yes. Version in six hours.

Kristin (Host): Hey! That's still faster than a lot of things. Some of the movies out there are three hours. If you guys can sit through the Avengers or something, it's like two Avengers.

Bob Doman (Speaker): You don't have to do it at the same time.

Kristin (Host): You guys are watching and you're loving what you're seeing and you think, Gosh, I wish that my husband would have been watching or I wish that my in-laws would've been

watching. You guys can go to autism hope summit.com you can buy the whole series. And here's the great thing. With the money that you spend to buy the series, that not only helps you and all your whole family to have all the education at your fingertips right away, but that money also goes back to the autism hope alliance, which gives scholarships to families in need through a nutritional scholarship program. For us it's a win-win. We're so honored to have people like Bob who take time out of their busy day to be here. I'm so proud of this summit, we just do our best. We're just people out there just trying to get information to families. So, Bob, I have two more questions left for you. First of all, when are you going to write a book?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Well, I'm working on one on autism.

Kristin (Host): You have been since the 1970s that you've been in this industry.

Bob Doman (Speaker): What I'm trying to do to help people, parents really understand autism. I'm giving a historic perspective showing that the steps that we've taken, the things we have learned to help put it all together, it's complex. Autism is complex. It is not a simple answer. And the more parents can really understand the pieces, the better job they're going to do at understanding their child and then helping your child. So, it's a process. But I keep learning new things all the time, so the book making may be going on forever before I actually get it finished. This is definitive, but hopefully-- My staff is on my case. My families are on my case. Hopefully, I'll get it done here in the next year.

Kristin (Host): We're going to hold you to that. For those families that are watching, what's your final message that you want to leave with them?

Bob Doman (Speaker): Perceive your child has having unlimited potential. Do not perceive your child is having an incurable disease.

Kristin (Host): I love that.

Bob Doman (Speaker): Understand that the nature of every brain in every child in the world is it can be changed and it can be developed, but it's work. It's often hard work and we've got to work with the whole child and do it properly or we're not going to achieve anywhere near the results we want.

Kristin (Host): Something I've learned from you in one of our consults was- and it sticks with me forever. It's one of my most memorable quotes. I've said it before. People have heard me say it. It's from Bob, just so you all know, is a child is capable of limitless growth at any age. And that is something that sticks in my heart every single day as our children get older and older. Guys never give up. Our children are in there. We just have to figure out how to teach them the way they need to be taught to help their brains continue to grow. Thank you all for watching. Thank you so much, Bob, for being here today. And until next time, bye guys.